Psalm 139
by I've Been a Labrat
Summary: He wishes he could tell the men who raised him to stop their silly nonsense that had given them grief so much over the years. Because it stresses David out in present day. But he can't, not without changing the present, so he wipes their minds when he's done. At least he gains satisfaction from reading off his list.


_This is another fic focusing on David Haller, Charles's son in comic canon. This actually takes place in my Join Me/Hope universe, though it's not necessary to read either._

* * *

It was an exercise he'd dreamt up in recent years. When he couldn't think of anything else to do to calm his heart and cease his endless urge to bawl, he grabbed Nathan and had the younger man take him backward in time. Back to Charles and Erik, as they'd been in the sixties. Back in the era of Mod and Civil Rights and drugs and brinkmanship and when his father and guardian had met.

He always had Nathan take him back to the same night. A few weeks before the infamous "Cuba," but they were at the mansion by this point. Darwin was dead, Tempest had betrayed them, the White Queen was in CIA custody, and the rest were training.

The introductions he got out of the way easily. His telepathy, his facial features, and his memories of things his father had told him over the years were convincing enough, and Erik was at the point where he trusted things, even if warily, if Charles did.

His exercise was simple. Tell his parental figures what had gone wrong over the years. Ask them why they had or hadn't done things. Listen to their words of apology and requests for forgiveness.

Then wipe their minds so they would never remember anything of that night, leaving David still having suffered, but also more at peace each time after listening to Charles and Erik's thoughts of love for him.

It eased his throbbing headache and building nausea. Made him feel calmer.

* * *

He had a whole list written out. After a time, he added or subtracted items from his list, written in a composition notebook. The items were listed in the order which they appeared in his mind, so not necessarily in the order of utmost importance.

"Please don't send me to retard school," he'd begged every time, just as he had as a child.

One of the worst of many horrible experiences in his life. Oh, sure, the idea of it had sounded rather nice, actually. If everyone there was branded a "retard" then there'd be no more bullying and he might make friends.

He made exactly two friends in the three years he attended that stupid school. One died of his congenital heart defect, the other wasn't really a friend, just an unwilling listener to his chattering since she couldn't even voluntarily blink, let alone have a conversation.

The teachers were good and bad, depending on the time of year. Other students were still bullies even though they'd been picked on. He bashed a girl in the head with a textbook because she called him names and picked him up just to shake him so hard he couldn't walk when she let go, then had the audacity to laugh. The final straw had been her repeatedly poking him in the back with a pencil. Bitch.

The last year he went to that school was abruptly ended because his father had been absolutely livid, more so than David had ever seen, upon discovering his son was being called a bastard and yelled at by the teachers. Erik had been eager to throttle a few people, though he resisted because it wouldn't do for him to become a federal fugitive again. It would have gotten Charles's school shut down.

* * *

Next on the list: "Please kill Jean Grey before she becomes a student. I'm not saying it was bad that she killed so many members of the Friends of Humanity before Erik had to kill her, I just… I don't want her around at all. She's dangerous."

Honest to God, she really had been dangerous. He'd felt something off about her from the moment she arrived in Westchester as a young girl. Scott and Ororo had been her assigned "student buddies" and shown her around the school, helping her with the ins and outs of the place. They barely thought about her these days, hardly anyone did besides David, Charles, and Erik. And Clarice, since she'd been there, however briefly.

It was Halloween night. Ororo was dressed as Luke Skywalker, Scott as Han Solo, and Jean as Princess Leia. All from _Return of the Jedi_, which they'd obsessed over for the past three years since it came out. David liked fiction, yes, but science fiction never appealed to him. Even if it disappointed his father a little to know he didn't like _Star Trek_. Hank and Peter were doing this costume contest thing at the comic book store in town, going as Doc and Marty McFly. The other adults were dressed as _Star Trek_ characters. David remembered fondly how Erik was Spock and his father was Kirk.

The other kids, of ranging ages, had been dressed in clothing of various decades. Betsy had dressed like she'd hopped out of a Hooverville. Lorna was showing off her arm muscles from various sports in her Rosie the Riveter costume. Rahne was a gangster in a zoot suit and fedora, packing heat with a fake tommy gun and one of Logan's unlit cigars in her mouth. Clarice was enamored with everything from the seventies, thus she went clad in bell bottoms and a peasant shirt, flowers in her long pink and black hair. Doug had put on a tan colored suit and wire framed glasses, carrying around a camera from the fifties.

David hadn't wanted to go. He hated, constantly, how people always got distracted by his complete heterochromia and his blue hair, not focusing on the stupid costume like they were supposed to. On top of it, he always felt awkward around people in general. Even with Lorna, Ororo, Peter, and Scott, who were all his adopted siblings. He never felt comfortable, imagining it like he was in someone else's skin and never acting as was proper. Erik had convinced him after some prodding, reminding him turtlenecks were perfectly acceptable for the sixties era, and David had gone downstairs to join everyone else going out for candy.

About halfway through the night, David had been feeling pretty good about himself. Already having gathered a sizable amount of candy and wishing his parents didn't insist on inspecting it before he ate any, he had been so distracted by the fun everyone was having that he didn't notice the figures tailing them. Ororo and Scott had, and Rahne smelled something off, because all three of them had been training to be X-Men someday. Then the figures attacked, swooping in and dragging Jean, David, and Clarice. He'd screamed and cried for his father and Erik, and he'd heard Lorna's horrified screaming for him, even felt the tug on the cage enclosing him. Her powers weren't strong enough yet to free him.

They were transported quickly, blindfolded until they were put into a cold, concrete room with dripping pipes. It was lit by glaring fluorescent lights, the beams giving him a headache. Or maybe that had been his terror and longing for his father and Erik. Daddy and Papa. Clarice's cage had been about to be opened, but she'd had one jagged crystal she carried as backup out of deep rooted fear for her safety, and she leapt through the portal before they could grab her.

He'd been sobbing, barely able to see past his own tears, but the "M" carved over his left eye, the green one, must've made Jean finally lose it. The inhuman screeching erupting from her scared him enough to make him wet himself, if he'd had anything left in his bladder after he'd already lost control earlier. Dark tendrils that quickly flashed into blinding light reached out, at first just reaching for the Friends of Humanity bastards, then they started grabbing at everything. He didn't remember much past the sudden burning around his ankle from where one tendril wrapped around, but he vaguely recalled the screeching suddenly going silent, the only noise in the room being his crying and someone else's heavy breathing. Erik picked him up then, muttering about something he couldn't understand.

Jean was dangerous and had almost killed him, merely because she lost control. His father still considered her one of his biggest failures, right up there with Jason Stryker. He hadn't been bad, and had heterochromia like David did. He'd actually been kind of fun, creating illusions of David's darkest fantasies just to make him feel better. Weird, but fun.

* * *

"Please don't let Mom go to Paris in 1982. She won't come back."

That was easy to explain, at its basis. Obviously she died somehow. It was hard to put into words, however. He'd been five at the time, young enough to move past it after a time, but still old enough to want to be destructive and then also become depressed. His father had put him in therapy, as he had done to himself.

Palestinian terrorist group. They'd hijacked a plane they knew had Israelis on board, and crashed it in some vineyard in Greece. There were no survivors, just charred and mangled corpses. His father hadn't needed to identify any body. The snap in his mental connection was enough to prove Gabrielle Haller-Xavier was gone.

That was when Erik, from that moment on, became the other most influential person in his life. He'd clung to Erik like a lifeline, as his father had been too wrapped up in his grief, hardly having the strength to drag himself out of bed in the morning. He'd done better than expected, which he later attributed to the existence of his children and everyone else at the school. Erik held David constantly, rocking him and telling him it'd be alright… eventually. He was optimistic and loving toward David, but also realistic. It wouldn't get better immediately.

It became a weekend activity for them for a year. Erik would go out and buy expensive china and crystal dishes, then he and David would go out to some back alley, and let the boy throw and smash the objects against the hard concrete walls. It was surprisingly therapeutic, to be allowed to destroy things. In the process, he destroyed his own pent-up feelings of grief, which he knew Erik had planned all along. The man didn't believe himself helpful in psychology, but as far as parental loss went, he was damn useful in his coping advice.

Erik let him destroy, and then told him that was enough. It was time to create, now. Music and art were David's therapy from there going forward. Erik taught him various drawing and painting techniques. David had struggled over the years, outright accusing Erik of lying to him about it being helpful in dealing with so much pain. So the metal manipulator had shown him the painting he did of his long deceased daughter, Anya. Sweet little smile on her pudgy face, blonde curls framing her face as she looked upward with sparkling blue eyes, the excitement captured on her face even though it wasn't really her.

"_How can you not cry?" It wasn't an accusation, only a question out of curiosity._

_Erik smiled fondly and patted David's shoulder, looking back at the painting of his little girl. Still practically a baby, when she'd been stolen from his life. "Because I have peace now."_

His father was the one to teach him music. Showing him scales and playing things ranging from Chopsticks to Fur Elise to Ride of the Valkyries adapted for piano. David hadn't believed he could create something so magical himself, insisting only someone like his endlessly intelligent, wise, and kind father could possibly do this sort of thing. But Charles had simply chuckled, though his eyes were red rimmed, and helped him place his fingers on the keys. They got out a metronome to help him with slowly tapping the ivory keys. David had giggled when he purposely pressed the ebony ones when he wasn't supposed to, watching as his father opened his blue eyes, stared hard at him for a moment, then chuckled and kissed his head.

He missed his mother, still. She had a kind face and a soft smile, all encompassing love even when he threw a fit and acted horrible. That pure, intense love only a parent could have for their child always surrounded his mind, making him feel safe and warm, protected in the tall shadows of his mother, father, and even Erik and Logan and all his uncles. And, if they somehow happened to fail, the green haired Polaris was always there to knock a few teeth out if some punk messed with David.

* * *

"Stop having nightmares about Sentinels or Trask or Shaw or Stryker. I know it's not your fault, but I still don't want to suddenly pick up on that in my own sleep, okay?"

That one was kind of a no-brainer. Shaw was part of the reason Erik had forbidden the children under his care from reading anything about the Holocaust until they were _at least_ sixteen. It might have been extreme, or it might have simply been protecting their innocence regarding the subject of genocide for as long as possible.

Shaw was a monster disguised as a twisted man. He looked harmless in Erik's dreams. Glasses, slicked back hair, blue eyes. Heh. From that basic description, he might've been like David's father. But there was no similarity. Charles's blue eyes were wise but also full of compassion for other people, human and mutant. Shaw's were that of a snake, filled with venom and deadly intent for anyone he took a sick fascination in. Like Erik.

The only reason Erik hadn't died was that under all the prayers to a merciful God for death to deliver him from this Hell on earth, there was still a will to survive. Max was still alive and kicking. He hadn't died when Edie's blood pooled underneath her. Max still thrived and screamed for Erik to keep going, to survive and pull through it all. Max screamed at Erik to stay with Charles all these years, too. Max was always cracking the whip on Erik, telling him to stop being foolish and pessimistic. Telling him to believe there was good in people. Telling him to believe he could be happy again.

Stryker and Trask were wildly rampant in Charles's mind. They were allowed the run of the place, wreaking havoc-David might've laughed at that word, had his heart not still ached after all these years of living without Uncle Alex-in Charles's brain. He twitched and moaned in his sleep, tears spilling onto his pillow as he remembered everything. Trask was a disgusting excuse for a person. He admired mutants, yet wanted to exterminate them so he could ensure the humans would not become extinct through the natural process of evolution.

His fascination with genetics was a stark contrast to everything Charles had worked for and studied in his life. Where Charles saw a future worth marvelling at, Trask saw a future where mutants would be the monsters that scared children at night, only they would now rule everything. Where Charles saw the very tangible possibility of teaching people better and encouraging coexistence and acceptance, Trask saw only one solution: That of annihilating mutants as a whole so humans could continue to wallow and fester in their open sores of discriminatory lives. Blasting mothers, grandparents, fathers, siblings, children, babies into particles smaller than dust, so there was only homo sapien, no longer homo superior.

The experimentation was what sickened David the most. He did not hold as much kinship with mutantkind as Erik did, largely due to his constant feeling of alienation from everyone else. But that didn't mean he was devoid of empathy for other people in times of suffering. It was why he had to leave museums, shut off movies, and close books, because he started bawling too hard to get himself under control again. He saw the autopsy reports and pictures in Erik's mind, in his dreams. The black and white photographs of people had never known and now never would, because they had been murdered in cold blood and butchered like pieces of meat. They were not people. They were merely objects used in Trask's goal of mutant genocide.

What was worse, was Erik's dreams twisted into his worst fears, and the photographs morphed into that of Charles, and Lorna, and Peter, and Hank and Raven and Scott and Ororo and then finally settled on David. That was always where he woke up screaming himself hoarse, gagging to the point of something coming up his throat. Erik and Charles were always there, Charles holding him and putting a deep dreamless sleep suggestion into his mind while Erik cleaned things up and got him water.

The Sentinels were monstrous. They were once Biblical guardians, fearsome and strong in their mission. Religion was the thing most often twisted by man for his own devices. Trask had taken it to a whole new level, creating a physical _wrong_ interpretation in these horrific machines. Their soulless yellow eyes gleamed behind their "faces" before their arms, only guns that could fire impossibly fast and enormously high numbers of bullets, ended the lives of mutantkind and any humans who tried to help the poor scattered mutants.

Erik hadn't wanted to be right. The only reason the wise man didn't wake up screaming over any of this was because it was over by this point… hopefully. Stryker was dead, so there was no more truth serum and brainwashing, nor adamantium experimentation and memory wipes. Trask was dead, killed by a very blessedly human vigilante who did not kill out of sympathy for mutants, but out of anger over his betrayal after attempting to sell government secrets to foreign countries. But it didn't matter. Mutantkind would take what it could get, though thankfully by this point they could afford to be a little picky, such was Hank's decision to resign from the Department of Mutant Affairs after the Cure was weaponized behind his back.

Shaw was dead as a doornail, and had been for decades upon decades. Erik's oldest haunt, which he'd gladly disposed of when he was still a young man. It hadn't brought him the right kind of peace, but it had brought him peace in that he no longer had nightmares and was no longer obsessed with revenge against that man. But none of it mattered now. Erik had peace now, so long as he got his coffee in the morning and so long as his students didn't act up in class. Erik had peace so long as Lorna came back from each mission perfectly alive and whole and well and snarky like her father.

He just wanted Erik and his father to stop having nightmares a lot sooner than they did. It would help David sleep and breathe easier.

* * *

"Don't _ever_ send me to that horse shit called occupational therapy. Come on, Dad, you hated it when you had to go. Why would you sentence me to the same hell?"

It didn't help him become more independent. If it had, he wouldn't still be living with his father at almost forty years old. He couldn't cook, clean, dress, or bathe himself regularly and without at least minor help. He forgot things constantly or just couldn't make his hands move correctly to be able to button a few goddamned buttons or wash his fucking hair. Daddy to the rescue… as always. When he was younger, sure, it had been a veritable _godsend_ for Daddy dearest to help him out with everything and pretty much do things for him. It saved him the frustration and inevitable tears over not being able to do it. Now, it was more like an extremely reluctant thing he had to make peace with needing for the rest of his life, and the tears and frustration spilled over after he held it in himself for a long while. Record was six months, then he'd had what was likely the biggest meltdown of his life and promised his father he wouldn't emotionally suppress himself again.

If occupational therapy had helped, he would have been able to go to college and get a real job. Oh, what sweet dreams he'd started to have in high school. Going to college had begun to seem like something he could really do in life. He'd gotten his hopes up, built them into a wobbling and high tower, reaching up to the heavens. Lorna went off to college and he got so excited, wriggling like an excited puppy and announcing proudly it was going to be his turn next. He got his high school diploma, his father being the one to hand it to him, and he'd grinned like a loon as he strutted off the stage like he owned the place. But then when he took the SAT, he broke down in tears in the testing session and could only finish with his father telling him in his head it would be alright. His scores were abysmal, but his father had quietly informed him with enough money, any college would look the other way.

So they went to the local community college to enroll him in a semester of classes. He panicked and ended up crawling under a table, rocking back and forth to try to calm himself down despite his racing heart. Mind whirling like a spiteful hurricane, he'd gotten sick and had only started to improve when his father suggested they wait on college. They'd gone home, put an icepack on his head while he lay down on the couch in his father's study, and Charles read to him from _The Once and Future King_. David loved medieval and fantasy books, which had positively delighted his father and Erik, since they were both forever obsessed with that stupid book. Worse than _Star Trek _or _Star Wars_ or _Lord of the Rings_ fans, honestly. And there were millions of those, so that ought to put it into perspective how enamored Charles and Erik were with T.H. White's loose interpretation of the tales of King Arthur.

Obviously, since he had no college degree, he couldn't get a real job. He couldn't even be a damn manager at McDonald's, because that required a college degree. What a let down that must be, though, going through four years of expensive higher education just to work at the fast food restaurant that pops up everywhere like rabbits breed. David felt sorry for the poor bastard who had to work at that place. _Better them than me._

He wanted to try an internship at a governmental office, like the state capital. He knew what his father had done, by carefully steering him away from that and instead placing him under his crazy mad scientist Uncle Hank. But David couldn't bring himself to mind. Uncle Hank knew a ton about politics and law, and David got to have his own desk and small office, being Senator Henry McCoy's assistant. Paid assistant, really. After a year of working his hardest to help Hank with anything he needed, Hank had hired him as his official assistant. David didn't have to work much harder, since his uncle already had another assistant to make all the phone calls, and he enjoyed the free Starbucks and donuts he got every morning when he went to work in Washington. It was like a really long grand sleepover, living with Uncle Hank during those times. Plus, he got to work with Nathan, Hank's other phone calling assistant, and Hank lived on a steady artery-clogging diet of pizza, cheeseburgers, french fries, and KFC.

The lack of a _real_ job he'd actually had to apply for and _earn_, however, weighed heavily on him when he wasn't busy. He tried to keep himself busy, but sometimes his tasks were bland enough his mind would drift. Drift to the fact he had to live with family constantly because he couldn't take care of himself. Drift to the fact he couldn't go to college because he was too much of a baby and the thought of anything after high school scared the hell out of him. Drift to the fact that he was now lumped in with low life nerds who lived with their parents, mooched off the free food and laundry, always sat on a computer, and did nothing with their lives. It made him feel guilty. He asked his father and Erik plenty of times before if he was a disappointment. The complete lack of hesitation when they answered that no, he wasn't a disappointment, should have reassured him. It didn't.

If occupational therapy had done anything for him, he would be able to figure out how to maintain a solid relationship with Clarice. She'd been his childhood playmate, since she came to the school when they were both very young. He'd been head over heels before long, staring at her while he daydreamed, as children often do, about them getting married and having fun, awesome adventures together. He kicked Frodo and the others aside as he dragged Clarice along to throw the one ring into the fires of Mount Doom. Bonus points was Erik fought Smaug for them and yelled at people while carrying a giant stick. His father was what David called good-guy Gollum, and instead of biting David's finger off and acting creepy, he just helpfully gave them directions when David and Clarice got lost.

Clarice was beautiful. Her hair was pink and black, making her a freak like David. Her eyes were bright green, which was unnatural in humans, again making her a freak like David. She had purple tattoos on her face, which only made him feel better after the "M" was permanently carved into his face. Her skin was chalk white as David's was, symptoms of hating the outdoors. His father had informed them there was nothing wrong with getting very little exposure to sun, as it made them less susceptible to skin cancer and wrinkles. Clarice was fiery, reminding David of his sisters, yet she was blissfully free of sarcasm. Even after all the years of living with Erik, sarcasm still went right over his head.

As they got older, David began to have urges he never had around other people, which made him uncomfortable enough to start avoiding Clarice. She'd been hurt, and his father and Erik had finally dragged the truth out of him. His father had awkwardly explained about puberty and that the urges he had were normal, though it took Erik's more blunt approach to fully convince him the sky wasn't going to fall if he talked to Clarice again. He'd apologized the best he could, knowing social protocol dictated that was the right thing to do. She'd forgiven him, and he got good at quietly admitting he was feeling uncomfortable because his pants were suddenly tighter than they should be and he really had to go somewhere else for a while.

Discouragement set in quickly. He didn't kiss Clarice until he was twenty-eight, even though they'd weirdly agreed to be boyfriend and girlfriend for several years. David felt far too awkward and queer to try anything. He'd heard talk about bases and what to do in dating from classmates at school and from watching movies and tv shows. That did little to comfort him. There were no books called "I'm on the Autism Spectrum and Have No Fucking Idea How to Date a Girl PLEASE HELP ME FOR THE LOVE OF GOD." Erik's first wife left him after he lost control of his powers while seeing his daughter burn alive. Then he left his second wife after certain people came to be a threat to her and a one year old Peter. His third wife died in childbirth with Lorna. David's father was little help as well, since he'd had exactly one steady relationship in his life, and she'd died. Prior to that, all he did was sleep around carelessly, contracting STDs in the process and acting like a drunk frat boy.

Aunt Raven was no help, nor was Uncle Hank. Raven's lover had died after he knocked her up with David's cousin, Kurt. And, Kurt might've been helpful, except he was too focused on Jesus and Mary and weird Catholic stuff that David didn't understand nor care about. Uncle Hank was married with one kid, but when David had asked him how he got to that point, Hank had shrugged helplessly and answered that he honestly hadn't a clue. Gee, Hank, thanks. You're as helpful as a broken stapler. Terry didn't have a clue, and Lorna was busy with her fiancé, Sergey. Who turned out to be slime, but it worked out because Erik killed the asshole for leaving Lorna. Sweet justice. But that didn't solve David's hopeless issue of interacting with the opposite sex, specifically the enigmatic Clarice Ferguson who could create sparkly pink portals and dressed like she was on Project Runway's episode on post-apocalyptic fashion. She made him feel like a limp noodle when she walked past, which was ridiculous because he shouldn't be this weird around anyone. He hated other people. That had always been his philosophy in life, to hate people. Yet here was Clarice, wrecking that philosophy like a jerk, and he couldn't even be that mad about it. He just wished someone would tell him how to properly like girls.

He was still at that point, honestly. He'd heard in his father and Erik's minds that they were making bets on how long it would take for David and Clarice to get engaged. He pretended he didn't hear any of that. He pretended he didn't start sobbing in his pillow so he didn't make any noise while he cried his eyes out over an impossible, unattainable future. There had always been everything wrong with him, from the beginning. He would never have a future with Clarice, because she was beautiful and smart and hilarious and perfect and everything he wasn't compatible with. He was just as his old classmates had said: a retarded loser.

* * *

"I know this isn't going to sit well with you, Dad, but… Let Erik go and play God. Let him smite everyone who worked on the Cure for the mutant gene and let him eradicate every trace of it on this planet."

He may still have been ashamed of his mental capabilities, but he'd be damned if someone tried to make him feel ashamed of being a mutant. Not again. He had worked so hard over the years to accept himself and embrace his mutations. He would never again despise the eyes or hair or mental powers he'd been born with. Why should he hate that part of himself when that was what made him evolution's next step? When that made him better than all the miserable piss ants who bullied him as a child, and the assholes who tried to abduct and kill him for being a mutant? Why would he hate the part of himself that made him so much better than everyone who didn't express the x-gene?

Perhaps that might've been Erik's words he echoed, but he believed them. Mutant and proud, dammit.

He wasn't clapping his hands and jumping up and down in eagerness to kill all the humans, nor snoring that phrase in his sleep. His father still had influence over him, still convinced him the humans didn't need to be eradicated. Still convinced him that would make David no better than those who wanted mutant genocide.

_However_, humans were still a threat. It depended on the person, really. Some people were irredeemable wads of spit, some people were just temporary asses who could be taught different and then be on the mutants' side. The situations varied, and so David believed in moderation. Somewhere between Erik and his father.

Still. Anyone who developed the Cure for mutants deserved to be blasted into nothing, so that there was no longer any matter to be buried.

There was no cure for mutation. It wasn't their fault they were the next stage in evolution. It wasn't their fault the humans were cowardly scum who preferred to call mutants demon spawn, God's mistake, any illness. They didn't have cancer or AIDS. They didn't desperately need a solution to their "problem."

It made David shudder. A reminder that he had two things that apparently so urgently needed curing. A reminder he might've been "cured" of both, had the psycho televangelists had their way with his "diseased" mind and the Friends of Humanity had their way with his "sick" body. His father and Erik had threatened horrible things to the extreme if they dared to approach David again, so they'd left him alone. It didn't make it much easier, but it did help a little. Helped to know he had guardians who would always keep him safe.

But they were still out there. Lurking in the shadows, and had finally sprung forward with claws outstretched to solve the mutant problem. They believed the mutant problem to be something of utmost importance. Mutants believed the same.

The similarities ended there. They believed the problem was that mutants were walking plagues, infected by a horrible disease that would kill anyone normal a mutant came into contact with. Mutants believed the problem was that humans were ignorant bastards who reinforced the idea in history that sharing and accepting had never been humanity's defining attributes.

They believed the problem was that mutants were demon spawn, a mistake made by the almighty God. David had snorted at that. In all his years growing up and learning of God, nothing in the Bible suggested that God made mistakes. No, people may have thought it was a mistake, but the lord planned everything. One of the quotes he had clung to, in order to hold onto his faith despite all he'd endured, brought him more peace than turmoil. Lorna was always questioning. She and Ororo both. Always questioning things and letting themselves get wrapped up in the worst of the world. David fought against it, while Scott always had a pot of water simmering. It would threaten to boil over if he was less soft spoken, less in control. As it was, he wouldn't flip his lid, but that anger still brewed deep within him. Scott was so angry underneath everything. He hadn't been angry when David first knew him. But… after Alex, Scott had grown to be hateful, deep within himself. He always had himself tightly under control, just as tightly as his emotions were wound. Neither could snap, or it would be ugly.

Ororo had been afraid for so long as a child, jumping at her own shadow and running from everyone who tried to help. She turned that terror into hate. Hate for the humans, giving up on pitying their ignorance in favor of always thinking, fantasizing on wanting to teach them a lesson. Erik was proud, but he had the sense not to show that pride very often. He had chosen to side with Charles for a reason, and thus counseled their angry brood rather than encouraged. Lorna wasn't angry very often. Oh, sure, irritated near constantly with other people, no matter their race. Humans and mutants alike got her worked up over their "stupidity" as she claimed. But angry wasn't something Lorna became that much. She'd taken more to Charles's idea of coexistence and fighting only when necessary. She was loud and out there with her opinions, but she was also constantly thinking. Questioning everything and analyzing all sides to an equation or altercation. It left her conflicted so terribly often.

She hadn't found peace in religion, nor had Ororo, nor had Scott. Peter was… well, he was set in his ways long before David was born. He was goofy and didn't seem to care all that much about religion one way or another. He was easygoing about pretty much anything, really. Few things riled him up, and that ranged from someone picking on Lorna to someone being an ass about Charles's wheelchair.

David found comfort in it. Found comfort in God not to the same degree as Kurt, because Kurt was _far_ more devout than he was, yet he still felt safe in a synagogue or the simple chapel on the school grounds. Even surrounded by other people, all that uncomfortableness melted away as David listened to the words written into the holy texts. Yes, they had been twisted by men in the past for their own devices. Yes, it was likely the words in the texts themselves were twisted as well because the men who wrote them down had held enough power to twist it. It didn't matter to David. He would find comfort in a higher power and to hell with everyone who insisted he shouldn't. If Erik, after all his years of turning his back on God, could understand and willingly take him to service twice a week-one for Christianity, one for Judaism-then surely religion couldn't be all bad… right? Sometimes he had to wonder, but regardless, he believed in the existence of an all-powerful, all-knowing, constantly loving God.

It was slightly amusing, the scripture he found comfort in. A psalm by David. Obviously it was another David, but it still tickled him a little. One of the few reasons David could feel less alone and unguarded in the world, besides his very large, very loud family. It brought him hope that things would be alright, that nothing in his life was unintended. That all the sleights he'd suffered, all the outright abuse, had only been put there to make him strong enough to weather any future storm. Possibly why he hadn't thrown himself off the ledge at the news of the Cure. Because not only did he not need any sort of cure for his powers or appearance, because he was David, but he also didn't feel any extra… urge to end everything to escape it. The Cure wasn't inevitable. There needn't be a cure for anything except the self-hatred and internalized racism within mutants. The school existed for that reason. Start early with children in getting them to accept themselves, and they would mature into adults who loved themselves for what they'd been born with. David was admittedly still working on that, but he tried. He knew he'd be fine, however.

He had a place in this world. All people had a place in this world.

"_Even before I was born, you had written in your book everything about me." Psalm 139_


End file.
